Spot on. And a reminder of what's coming back to crush us just as soon as the Democrats return

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EcoWatch: President Obama’s recent announcement that he wants to begin normalizing relations with Cuba generated news around the world. But the Cuban province of Granma may soon be making headlines for another reason: its embrace of renewable energy.

From InstaPundit:

GREAT MOMENTS IN ENVIRONMENTALISM:

Cuba Becomes The First Country To Reach Net Zero. Shouldn’t We Be Celebrating?

There it was on the front page of Saturday’s New York Times: with a small assist from the United States, the island nation of Cuba has almost entirely ended the use of fossil fuels. Finally, we have the first country in the world to achieve the climate movement’s Holy Grail and nirvana — Net Zero! Or at least a very close approximation. This should be cause for a huge celebration.

You would think that the Times, which has been demanding the elimination of fossil fuels for at least a couple of decades, would be leading the celebrations. But weirdly, now that Cuba has finally shown the way, the Times chooses to put a completely different spin on the achievement. The headline and subheadline are (print edition): “U.S. Choking Oil Deliveries To Cuba Ports; Military Action Brings a Nation to Its Knees.”

The piece reports that the Trump administration is helping Cuba to achieve Net Zero by preventing oil tankers from landing there. Somehow in this piece, that is spun as a bad thing. It has brought Cuba “to its knees.”

The funny thing is that here in the U.S., it was just over a year ago that we had President Biden and an administration full of zealous environmentalists who were using every governmental power at their disposal to force Americans to stop using fossil fuels. By Executive Order 14057 of December 8, 2021, Biden had directed all federal agencies to pursue an aggressive “all of government” operation to achieve “net zero” on an accelerated schedule. Goals number 1 and 2 from that EO are “100 percent carbon pollution-free electricity on a net annual basis by 2030,” and “100 percent zero-emission vehicle acquisitions by 2035.” In 2023, the Department of Transportation released a “Blueprint” for eliminating all carbon emissions from the transportation sector. In 2024 EPA released a plan to eliminate fossil fuels from electricity generation. Similar initiatives were everywhere in the government.

More from the linked-to article in The Contrarian:

What am I missing? Since when are fuels like oil, gasoline, natural gas, and diesel any longer necessary, or even useful or economic, for providing energy to the people? The Times for years has been pounding a relentless drumbeat emphasizing that wind and solar are now the cheapest ways to produce energy, and all sane people are flocking to them as the best sources. For example, from August 17, 2023:

“As the planet registers the highest temperatures on record, rising in some places to levels incompatible with human life, governments around the world are pouring trillions of dollars into clean energy to cut the carbon pollution that is broiling the planet. The cost of generating electricity from the sun and wind is falling fast and in many areas is now cheaper than gas, oil or coal. Private investment is flooding into companies that are jockeying for advantage in emerging green industries.”

In other words, to eliminate use of fossil fuels all Cuba would have to do would be to slap up a few wind turbines and solar panels, and then it could run its economy on the abundant renewable electricity without need for any of those icky fossil fuels. And saving money too! Cuba actually has a bunch of wind farms. Why doesn’t it just crank them up to provide the power formerly supplied by the fossil fuels?

It seems like the people who are writing these pieces for the Times don’t read their own newspaper.

Presumably, Trump helping Cuba reach Net Zero has the backing of the German Greens, who dusted off the Morgenthau Plan to return Deutschland to the Dark Ages,  Scientific American, and Kamala Harris:

Bonus Material

While looking at that EcoWatch page touting Cuba’s transformation I came across this article from the same time; this is the kind of garbage reporting being fed to school children, and is the reason why they’re unwittingly cheering on the destruction of their comfortable world.

Bonaire (pop. 14,500), a small island off the coast of Venezuela, is famous for its beautiful marine reefs, which are visited by 70,000 tourists every year. What many of the tourists don’t realize is that the majority of the electricity powering their needs comes from renewable energy. Yet for the residents of Bonaire, the switch from fossil-fueled to renewable energy systems has made a world of difference.

Like many Caribbean islands, Bonaire originally relied on diesel fuel to generate electricity for residents, with a peak demand of 11 megawatts (MW). This fuel had to be shipped in from other nations, resulting in high electricity prices for Bonaire residents, along with uncertainty about when and how much prices might increase with changing fuel costs.

In 2004, everything changed when a fire destroyed the existing diesel power plant. Although tragic, the situation provided an opportunity for Bonaire to consider what kind of new electricity system to build. Temporary diesel generators were rented to provide power for the short term. Meanwhile, the government and local utility began working together to create a plan that would allow Bonaire to reach a goal of generating 100 percent of its electricity from renewable sources.

Bonaire’s Electricity System Transformation

The result is a transformed electricity system on Bonaire. The island is now home to 12 wind turbines with a total of 11 MW of wind power capacity, which contribute up to 90 percent of the island’s electricity at times of peak wind, and 40-45 percent of its annual electricity on average. Battery storage (6 MWh) is included in order to take advantage of available power in times of excess wind, and provide that stored electricity in times of low wind.

The battery also boosts the reliability of the overall system—it is capable of providing 3 MW for over two minutes, allowing time for additional generation to be started when there is a sudden drop in wind.

“Over two whole minutes! We’re saved!”

The Bonaire system also includes 14 MW of diesel generation, five total generators, which provide the necessary power to meet the load when there is not enough wind power available. The generators are equipped to run on both traditional diesel as well as biodiesel. The next steps in the island’s energy transformation involve using local algae resources, grown in the large salt flats on the island, to create biofuel, which can then be used in the existing generators. This will allow Bonaire to operate a 100 percent renewable electricity system—with on average 40–45 percent from wind and 55-60 percent from biodiesel.

The new electricity system led to more reliable electricity, more employment opportunities, reduced dependence on oil (and its fluctuating prices), and a reduction in electricity bills. Bonaire residents currently pay $0.22/kWh for electricity, much lower than prices on other nearby Caribbean islands, which are often $0.36/kWh or above. When oil prices spiked in 2008, while Bonaire was still using temporary diesel generators before making its transition to renewables, electricity prices on the island reached $0.50/kWh. The new electricity system also created jobs for the construction and ongoing operation of the wind farm, and for research and development of algae production capabilities and conversion to biofuel. Additional employment opportunities will be created for continuing algae production and operation of the biodiesel plant.

Bonaire as Inspiration for the Caribbean

The success of the updated electricity system on Bonaire provides an important example to other nearby islands of the opportunity to achieve high levels of renewable energy penetration.

Is that true? Did it really switch to 100% renewable energy? Well … no.

AI Overview

No, the island of Bonaire does not operate 100% on renewable electricity

As of 2022–2023, approximately 20–30% of its electricity is generated from renewables (mostly wind, with some solar). The remainder of the power is produced by a hybrid, petroleum-based (diesel) system, though the island aims for 80% renewable energy by 2030.

Key Findings on Bonaire's Electricity:

  • Current Mix: Roughly 22% of electricity needs are met by renewables, primarily via the ContourGlobal wind farm and expanding solar installations.

  • History: The share of renewable electricity peaked around 2014 at roughly 42% but has since varied between 20% and 30%.

  • Challenges: Due to intermittent wind, the island relies on diesel generators and has installed battery storage to stabilize the grid.

While the island has achieved 100% renewable generation at specific, short-term peak times, it does not currently sustain this level of generation around the clock.

So it all worked out in the end

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The builder who picked up 24 Valley Road in Cos Cob, for $1.025 million last February (2025) gutted it, expanded it from 1,429 sq. ft. to 3,221, and put it back on the market in October, priced at $2.478 million. He didn’t get it, so he began dropping its price, without success until he hit $2.198, whereupon a bidding war broke out, and he sold it today for $2.4 million.

Murphy boycotts the SOTU and attends an anti-SOTU circus instead, accompanied by a refugee — and a giraffe

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First up, the President:

"One of the great things about the State of the Union is how it gives Americans the chance to see clearly what their representatives really believe," Trump said. "So, tonight, I'm inviting every legislator to join with my administration in reaffirming a fundamental principle. If you agree with this statement, then stand up and show your support. The first duty of the American government is to protect American citizens, not illegal aliens."

Republicans exploded. They stood, clapped, and whistled for a solid two minutes. It was the kind of raw, spontaneous reaction you can't manufacture.

Democrats didn't move.

Not a shuffle. Not a courtesy clap. Nothing.

Murphy, as noted, wasn’t present. The Nutmeg senator did, however, issue a press release:

Murphy Announces People's State of the Union Guest, Fereshteh Ganjavi, Afghan Refugee And CT Nonprofit Founder

February 24, 2026

WASHINGTON—U.S. Senator Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) on Tuesday announced he has invited Fereshteh Ganjavi as his guest for the People’s State of the Union, a rally on the National Mall counterprogramming President Trump’s address to a joint session of Congress.

A refugee from Afghanistan, Ganjavi is the Founder and Executive Director of Elena’s Light, a Connecticut-based nonprofit dedicated to helping refugee women and children integrate into the United States, and whose services include Know Your Rights trainings, ESL and citizenship test classes, legal assistance, and health and wellness programs.

“I could not be prouder to have Fereshteh - a real Connecticut hero - as my guest for the People’s State of the Union,” said Murphy. “We know Trump is going to shamelessly lie to the American people about his cruel, failed policies, so our rally will highlight the people who are directly impacted by Trump’s brutality. That’s why I’m bringing Fereshteh: after coming to this country, she used her experience to support other refugees and has stood on the frontlines against Trump’s terror campaign on immigrant families. As Trump’s immigration crackdown sows chaos in our communities, advocates like Fereshteh show us the path forward through an unwavering commitment to supporting our communities.”

And here’s who entertained Murphy and Ganjavi:

UPDATE

Murphy gives his vision for post-election America circa 2027 — (resumption of) jailings of his party’s political opponents.

Tuesday on MS NOW’s State of the Union preview coverage, Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT) said if Democrats take back control of Congress in the midterm elections, people in the Trump administration are “going to jail.”

Discussing President Donald Trump, Murphy said, “He decided that his second term was going to be an organized kleptocracy, that he was just going to steal full time and make him and his family as rich as possible, and he was going to make a bunch of his buddies as rich as possible along the way. And that if he, at the same time, destroyed democracy, destroyed dissent, he could get away with it. The problem is, he hasn’t gotten away with it. He’s injured our democracy pretty badly. But the people are not cowed. They are still showing up to special elections to protest rallies in huge numbers. I think they’re going to get their clocks cleaned this November, and a bunch of people are probably gonna end up going to jail.”

And who are the friends he will hire to "scout" out these locations?

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Mamdani wants to blow $70M on ‘feasibility study’ for city-run grocery stores — as he claims NYC is broke: sources

Mayor Zohran Mamdani wants to spend $70 million on a “feasibility study” for his government-owned grocery store pet project — even as he cries poverty and threatens to raise taxes to fill the city’s coffers, The Post has learned.

Hizzoner is proposing the new funding for the city Economic Development Corporation simply to scout potential locations for the five stores he’s pledged to open in each borough, according to sources who reviewed preliminary budget documents.

One city source with knowledge of the plans described it as a “feasibility study.”

….

The former Queens state Assemblyman vowed on the campaign trail that he could easily roll out the five government-owned-and-operated food stores for merely $60 million.

$70 million to look for locations — hey, it’s a hard, demanding job — but minus $10 million to actually buy, stock and operate them — socialist math.

Follow-up on the previous post, but first, a word from Heathkit

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Good Lord, I had no idea they cost so much: that would be $351.24 in current dollars. Thanks, Dad — I didn’t know

Reader “Private Confidential” sent in a link to a YouTube video on the incredible story of microchip development: “you really REALLY need to see this video to grasp the complexity behind micro chips.”

I’m posting that video below, but Private’s note reminded me of an earlier post I’ve had in my draft folder for a couple of weeks, and it serves, I think, as a good introduction to the topic:

January 23, 2026

Heathkits!

(January 23rd) I ran across an old ad for Heathkits recently, and that got me wondering how many transistors were in the things back then, so I posed the following question to Grok:

Q: I remember assembling Heathkit walkie -talkies back in 1963 when I was a young lad, and I remember soldering individual transistors onto a circuit board, but I don't remember how many transistors were in a single simple device like that. Now that chips hold 1,000s (or more) [how hopelessly wrong I was on this guess — Ed] transistors, I'm curious: how many transistors were in those things back then?

AI Response:

In 1963, Heathkit offered a couple of popular walkie-talkie kits for the Citizens Band (CB) radio service, which were simple, license-free devices often assembled by hobbyists. The lower-cost model, such as the GW-30, used a basic superheterodyne circuit with 4 transistors.

This was a straightforward design focused on affordability and ease of building, with components like a few transistors for RF amplification, detection, and audio stages.For a more advanced option, the deluxe model like the GW-21 featured a 9-transistor superheterodyne receiver with additional features such as an RF amplifier stage for better sensitivity and range, plus 2 diodes.

Both involved soldering discrete transistors onto a circuit board, as integrated circuits weren't common yet for consumer kits.Given your description of a "simple device," it's likely you assembled something akin to the 4-transistor version, but the 9-transistor one was also widely available around that time.

These early transistor-based walkie-talkies typically operated at low power (around 100 milliwatts) on a single channel, with a whip antenna and a 9-volt battery.

Follow up question: how many transistors are in the most advanced modern computer chips these days?

AI Response:

The most advanced modern computer chips in early 2026 pack an astonishing number of transistors—far beyond what anyone could have imagined back in the Heathkit days! For consumer-grade processors (like those in high-end laptops, desktops, or workstations), Apple's M3 Ultra (a dual-die SoC) holds the top spot with 184 billion transistors as of March 2025, built on TSMC's 3 nm process.

The newer M4 Max (used in recent MacBook Pros and Mac Studios) is estimated around 90–100 billion transistors based on scaling from the base M4's 28 billion and prior generations like the M3 Max's 92 billion—still massive, but not quite at the Ultra level yet.

In the world of high-performance GPUs and AI accelerators, NVIDIA's Blackwell architecture (like the B100/GB100-based chips, released in 2024 and widely deployed by 2025–2026) features 208 billion transistors across a dual-die package on a custom TSMC 4NP process. This makes it one of the highest-transistor-count production chips for general-purpose computing and AI workloads right now.

Even higher numbers exist in specialized AI hardware. For example, Cerebras' Wafer Scale Engine 3 (WSE-3)—a massive, single-wafer-sized chip—reaches 4 trillion transistors, though it's not a traditional "computer chip" like a CPU or GPU; it's a purpose-built AI accelerator that's physically enormous (about 8.5 inches square).Looking ahead, industry roadmaps (from NVIDIA, TSMC, Intel, etc.) point to multi-chiplet designs pushing toward 1 trillion transistors or more in systems within the next decade, but single-package chips are currently in the low hundreds of billions for the absolute cutting edge.To put this in perspective from your 1963 walkie-talkie experience:

  • A simple 4-transistor Heathkit design → today's top chips have roughly 46 billion times more transistors (using the 184–208 billion range).

  • Even a deluxe 9-transistor version is dwarfed by factors of 20+ billion times.

The scale is mind-boggling—thanks to decades of shrinking process nodes (now down to 3 nm and below) and clever multi-die packaging. We're still riding the wave of Moore's Law (or something very close to it), just in more complex forms! If you're curious about a specific chip (like the latest NVIDIA or AMD offerings), let me know for more details.

Here’s that video: I’m slowly plowing my way through the entire 55 minutes, and it’s fascinating

Well. this doesn't sound good

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(don’t) let the chips fall as they may

PowerLine publishes “The Week in Pictures” every Saturday, and they’re always pretty amusing. The picture they paint in a post today, however, is not so funny:

Quote of the day

Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent, quoted in the New York Times: “The single biggest threat to the world economy, the single biggest point of single failure, is that 97 percent of the high-end chips are made in Taiwan. If that island were blockaded, that capacity were destroyed, it would be an economic apocalypse.”

Via John Ellis/News Items.

JOHN adds: It’s OK, though. AOC is on the case.

Older news, but just as alarming, is the world’s, and, especially, our country’s dependence on China’s pharmaceutical drug production; such as, 97% of all antibiotics.

AI Overview

China is a dominant global supplier of Active Pharmaceutical Ingredients (APIs) for critical medicines, with estimates suggesting they control

80–90% of global production for certain antibiotics and essential compounds. While direct Chinese, finished drug imports to the U.S. are lower, they constitute roughly 13–25% of U.S. API, with indirect reliance through India being much higher.

Brookings +3

Key details on China's role in the pharmaceutical supply chain include:

  • High Dependency on Ingredients: China is the primary source for key starting materials (KSMs) and APIs, with studies indicating that nearly 700 U.S. medicines rely on at least one chemical solely sourced from China.

  • Antibiotics & Specific Drugs: China produces about 97% of all antibiotics used in the U.S.. They also account for 95% of U.S. ibuprofen imports and 74% of acetaminophen imports.

  • Global Impact: In 2024, China was the largest foreign supplier of critical pharmaceutical inputs to the U.S. by volume (39.9% of imports).

  • Direct vs. Indirect Imports: While only 13% of FDA-registered API facilities supplying the U.S. were located in China as of 2019/2020, this does not account for the high volume of raw materials sent to India for final manufacturing.

The reliance is driven by lower labor costs and less stringent environmental regulations.

Two new listings coming to Riverside this Thursday

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16 Summit Road, $3.995 million. Built on the steep hill at the eastern end of Summit, its vertical design wins no architectural award in my eyes, but the owners have lived happily (I assume) here since 2005, so I guess no one’s tumbled off the slope, yet.

26 Glen Avon Drive, $5.995 million. Brother Gid’s bringing this back on the market after encountering buyer resistance last spring. I suspect that in this ever-accelerating market, its appeal has become less selective, and a happy ending will be soon achieved.

Nice house, excellent street, good neighbors, and with the Fountain boys no longer on Gilliam, two streets over, your chances of break-ins and arson are very much diminished.

Pending

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28 Thunder Mountain Road, so named, presumably, because of its proximity to the Merritt Parkway, reports a pending sale. Asking $6.650 million, it was originally priced at $6.550 back in July, raised it $100,000 in October (go figure), and found a buyer this month.

When it was new in 2006 its builder tried for $6.495 million but had to settle for $5.650 two years later, in 2008. Those buyers, in turn, attempted $5.595 in 2012 and finally sold to the present owners in 2014 for $4.490.

Thank you, Mamdani?

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63 Wesskum Wood Road, * Riverside, was put on the market January 14th at $4.190 million and sold to a Brooklyn family (11211 Zip) today for $5.148 million. Joe Barbieri had both the listing and the buyer, but with Joe involved, there’s no question about the integrity of the bidding process. Besides, Joe needs the money.

*Sotheby’s has removed its own page for this house, so I’ve switched the link to Zillow; we’ll see how long that lasts.